Timekeeping

Timekeeping ©

By Michael Casey

I’m late, I’m late for a very important date said the rabbit in Alice in Wonderland, you are late you are late I say every morning as my daughter glides out the door to school, finally. Girls just have to wash their hair first thing in the morning, why not do it the night before? Or once a week as some blokes do, or don’t.

I used to work shifts, night shifts for 14years, even 12 hour night shifts, so I know all about catching buses and being on time. Especially if you had to get a handover from the evening shift, or you wanted to dash for the bus after the evening shift. Time is money, or rather time is bedtime after a long shift, or time is fun time on the night shift. So time matters.

Kids love their phones, so instead of just wash, eat and then out the door, its let’s talk about what we are going to talk about as we walk to school,  and let’s talk about what we are having for breakfast while we are having breakfast. All this goes on while in one hand they have a slice of toast, and in another they hold their phone, sometimes the jam is spread on the phone, or the phone is placed in the mouth. At times I’d like to flush the phone down the toilet.

Then there is demand for a pound for this and a pound for that, just as they go out the door, running as they don’t want to be late to meet their best mate. Why didn’t they ask the night before, you could have gone to the corner shop for change, now you have to trust them with a tenner. You won’t see any change back from that. Your daughters air kiss you as they run away, nearly stumbling over the school ruck sack with all the school books in it.

My small daughter takes after me, she reads a book, looking through the glass table as she eats, this protects the book, and amuses me. We leave on time, after mum has kissed Totoro our new kitten as she heads for her car. Me and my daughter we walk up the hill to the school, we are on time, we are good time keepers. The street is in fact our watch, why because we can read the street as well as we can read a watch.

There is a sky blue jaguar which we see every morning, he is turning into our road just as we are tuning out of it. So if we see him we know we are on time. Then there is Mrs Shufflebum, she is always pulling at her clothes, as if the knicker elastic is broken. She is a regular on our school run, as is the lady with the child who we meet in the street every day. There are two fat Asian lads too, if you like the street is like a giant cuckoo clock, everything is timed to perfection. There’s the lady dressed like a soldier who we see getting into her car every morning, numerous kids with parents attached, all on q, all of them part of some human clock, part of some natural ballet, this tells us that WE are on time.

On my way home there is the lady in the disability chair with her male carer, and the man with the two walking sticks, not to mention Mrs Candyfloss who looks as if a candyfloss has been stuck to her hair when she was not looking. So I don’t really need a watch, but I DO adore watches. A Cartier diamond bleu automatic would be my luxury if ever I had money to waste, I’m just hoping I get some change back from that tenner.